downgrade some elementalist elites to regular skills

You look at a lot of ele elite damagers and then Ritualist skills and start wondering IMO.

A lot of the ele damage elites have conditions, exhaustion, or repeating -energy costs to keep them in line. Do they need the elite tag as well?

Meanwhile Ritualists have a lot of ways to get energy back, do damage even in an area, knockdowns, blinds etc a lot more reasonably.

A simple move like that could really help eles mix it up again.
Produce a shortage of elites? Well supposedly there are 10-15 more coming.

Hopefully they're not also mostly conditional, exhausting, and/or energy draining 'elite' abilities

CKaz

There are no need for any to be downgraded. At least I cant think of one, perhaps some example would help?

All the Mind X skills are pretty weak.
As is Mist Form compared to Obsidian Flesh. They're for different things, but really. Obsidian Flesh stops all spells (which really do more damage) and gives an armour bonus. Mist Form stops attacks from hitting (although conditions get through) and stops you from attacking. And it has a longer cast time. The slow effect of Obsidian Flesh really doesn't counter that in my opinion.

I don't like Mind skills because they give exhaustion, but that's just me. I'm sure other peopel use them though (especially Mind Shock/Freeze).

The mind spells are actually very good. Mist form is nothing like Obsidian flesh...They dont do the same thing....at all....

Mist form would prolly be better if it wasnt water.

Ye guys aint considering the combination of skills, thats why IMO most skills r elite.
Think HB + IW d: (Altho they aint Ele skills.)

o/

Upgrade the mind spells instead. Each mind spell produces the characterising effect of the line. So, mind burn=fire...but that 6 degen for a while does hurt. I would say take out the exhaustion or simply make them do more damage.

What about Glimmering Mark? That skill needs a lot of love. Either make it nonelite (and have it still not used) or make it a spammy, cheaper version of Blinding Flash.

yeah if yer gonna spend an elite the glimmering mark should be spammable cuz a non elite skill to do basically the same thing shouldnt be incalcuably better than the elite.

also all water magic spells need a buff. then maybe people would use water in general and those elites would fit into bars. i mean they could honestly do better. what about atidal wave or something cmon its totally lame that entire skill trees arent even touched cuz they are so wothless

The only water skills I use are Ward against Harm, Shardstorm (snare), Maelstrom (PvE monk shutdown), Water Trident, Ice Spikes (Group snare), blurred vision (causing enemy to miss), Armor of Mist (for extra armor when being attacked).

Armor of Frost = reduced protection from fire. Okay if you use with Ward Against Harm.
Mist Form = only good for farming.
Conjure = only good for warrior/ranger primary.
Rust = not as good as ignorance.
Ice Prison = not effective since 90% of Ele's on your team are fire.
Frozen Burst = PBAOE. Only good for warriors/earth ele. primary.
Deep Freeze = 25 energy just to do some mediocre damage and 10 seconds of 66% slower. I use Ice spikes for the same effect, because it is 10 less energy and 1 second less cast time.
Swirling Aura = 60 second recharge.
Ice spear = half normal spell range, which translates to very much danger.
Mind Freeze = affects only one target 90% slower and not very good for an elite unless you want to snare.

Elite, conditional and causing exhaustion? They're far from very good, the only one I've ever seen the use for is Mind Freeze to keep someone in Maelstrom, but even then there are much easier (and cheaper) ways to keep someone shut down.


I don't mean they're the sane spell, but Mist Form could be considered the water equivalent of Obsidian Flesh. But Mist Form isn't viable in PvP at all, whereas Obsidian Flesh can be really useful, especially in RA. As someone else said, right now it's only really good for farming.

Some ele elites are great, IMHO, Elites like:
Glyph of Energy
Glyph of Rewnal
Ether Prodigy
Ele Atune
Ward Against Harm
Mist Form
Obsidian Flesh
These elites would clearly cause balance problems if they wern't elite. Imagine if Ether Prodigy, Glyph of Energy, or Ele Atune wern't elites, why then the Mind-Spells would be of some use! Gasp, We can't have that! Eliteify them! Glyph of Rewnal being a non-elite would be a disaster of epic porportions. Spells like Mist Form, Obsid Flesh, Spellbreaker, etc are elites partly so you can't use them with Glyph of Rewnal. So not all ele elites are weak, but I'm pretty sure that wasn't your point anyway.

Some elites however, need some serious reworking. When was the last time you saw an ele use Glimmering Mark or Thunderclap? Seriously? How about Ether Rewnal... not since it was nerfed has it seen widescale use.

The problem with the mind spells is how conditional they are. Sure, ele's have more max energy, so what? Without an elite energy managment skill, it's hard to keep your energy at high enough levels for these skills to be of much use. Thier damage is good to decent, thier effects are nice, but they're so ridicusly frontloaded.

Lighting Surge is a good skill, but should it be elite? It's a required part of the Air-Spike, but it also telegraphs it's target rather clearly, and causes exaustion. The knockdown isn't even good for interuption. Oh, and it dosn't have armor penatration, like almost every other air spell. I'm sure there's gotta be some reason that this is elite besides it's use in Air-Spike, but I can't see it.

Water Trident is a nice elite for PvP, spamable, cheap, if slightly conditional knockdown is great. However, it's got a high arc, and it's damage is only *ok* for an elite. In PvE, this elite dosn't have enough of an impact to consider.

Elites that need improvement:

Lightning Surge: Since its a hex it could be made to ignore armor, or it needs AP like all the other Lightning Damage spells. Why is the elite Lightning spell weaker than Chain?

Mind Burn: This one especially needs a better work up. The spell should cause burning for a longer ammount of time than a normal spell would. Like 5-6 seconds instead of 3.

In fact, I would say the Elementalist Hex elites need to cause Armor Ignoring Damage. This would up the usefulness of all the Mind Spells.

It, uh, already does that.

Fire
Mind Burn-The buff to burning duration made this skill actually quite strong. It doesn't do the damage instantly, but will output a good 200+ damage now. Try it in RA. Problem is that it is practically the only good fire skill.

Air
Lightning Surge-This is an elite due to its one man spike capabilities with lightning orb. You cast this spell and then begin casting lightning orb. They both hit at roughly the same time spiking the target for about 250 damage and knocking them down. It will remain an elite, but possibly it could use a bit of a buff.

Mind Shock-Do not underestimate this skill, it does damage equal to orb, it easily follows an orb, it knocks the target down, and it gets most of its damage through prot spirit (because it is applied in two parts.) A great skill.

Glimmering Mark-Yeah it sucks, at lot. However it should remain an elite and get a buff.

Thunderclap-This skill has a very powerful effect and if not carefully balanced it is extremely powerful (as seen by the R/E builds that popped up when the skill was bugged.) Definately has to be elite, just could use some careful rebalancing.

Water
Water Trident-Excellent skill, definately worth an elite

Mind Freeze-Alright, it still pretty much sucks. It should probably be buffed again though.

Ward Against Harm-This actually has a very strong effect. Fire damage just isn't very popular at the moment. The addition unconditional armor is pretty nice. A good skill in PvE.

Mist Form-Its effect forces it to be elite, however it isn't something you would want to ever use.

Earth
Obsidian Flesh-Immunity to spells means it has to be elite

Energy Storage
Ether Renewal-Energy management skill, needs to be elite. Just not that useful at the moment

Ether Prodigy-Against needs to be elite because it is energy management. A very powerful skill and definately worth the slot.

Ele Other
Glyph of Energy-Energy management, exhaustion mitigation, great skill

Glyph of Renewal-Phenominal Skill, superior to echo in almost every situation

Elemental Attunement-Powerful energy management, worth of an elite slot

With all the ele elites Mind Burn, Mind Freeze, Glimmering Mark, and Ward Against Harm could possibly work as regular skills. Mind Burn and Ward Against Harm would need to be nerfed however. Personally I would rather prefer to see the sub-par elites brought up to par.

I think the water line need some buff. A good option is to make them slow attacks.

For elites, yes the mind x thing exhaustion thing is annoying.
I think lighting surge is a good elite spell, it is a good spiking combo for 4v4.

It's a completely predictable spike, rendering it rather pointless. Exhaustion and no armor penetration makes it even more so.

You think conditional orb-equivalent damage is actually good for an elite? On top of exhaustion and a higher recharge?

Mind shock is a crap elite. There are plenty of ways to get knockdown without sacrificing your elite slot. Either it becomes a normal skill or it gets a damage buff (10-63/10-63 sounds about right to start). Oh and remove the exhaustion.

Still, lightning surge's ability to combo very well with orb forces it to be an elite. It is a weak in in 8v8, but it does have some application in 4v4. The skill itself probably could use a bit of a minor buff, but it needs to remain an elite due the way it combines with orb for a 1-man damage spike.

As for Mind Shock, you seriously need to try this skill out. It is extremely powerful. I've used it plenty and it is quite strong. If a target gets prot spirit you still get around 80 damage through. It has a 1 second cast time allowing you to follow orb with another orb strength hit. You can easily spike a target for 200+ damage with this combination.

Try this in TA:
3 Ele/Me
16 Air
8 Inspiration
10 Energy Storage

Lightning Strike
Lightning Orb
Mind Shock
Gale
Drain Enchant
Power Drain
Mantra of Resolve
Rez Sig

Count from 3 to 1, on 2 queue up orbs and mind shock.

1 Boon Prot